Notes on effective writing at work, school, and home by Philip Vassallo, Ed.D.

Sunday, July 24, 2016

Reading Scripts to Achieve Clarity

Reading plays is an excellent way to get a feel for the dialogue of life in general, and the questions of businesspeople in particular. Few people read plays, yet we write at work based on imagined dialogues with our readers.Imagine opening an internal proposal to your manager with this sentence:

Splitting the Northeast Region into two sales territories will double our coverage, leading to 25% additional revenue after the first year.

You are assuming the following dialogue:

Manager: What do you want?

You: We should split the Northeast Region into two sales territories.

Manager: Why?

Writer: It would double our coverage.

Manager: What would that do?

Writer: We would increase revenue by 25 percent after the first year.

Reading dramatic pieces not only entertains, it also gives insight into how people react, reply, retract, and repeat. Read some plays with this thought in mind and see how your ear for your audience improves.

PHIL VASSALLO

Philip Vassallo is a communication and education consultant. Phil is the author of three instructional books (HOW TO WRITE FAST UNDER PRESSURE, THE ART OF ON-THE-JOB WRITING, and THE ART OF E-MAIL WRITING), two play collections (QUESTIONS ASKED OF DYING DREAMS and A CASE-BY-CASE BASIS: FOUR SHORT PLAYS), two essay collections (PERSON TO PERSON: ESSAYS FROM TWO CENTURIES and THE INWARDNESS OF THE OUTWARD GAZE: LEARNING AND TEACHING THROUGH PHILOSOPHY), and two poetry collections (LIKE THE DAY I WAS BORN: 40 POEMS, 40 PLACES, 40 DAYS and AMERICAN HAIKU). Twenty-one of his plays are licensed through Samuel French, Heuer Publishing, and Brooklyn Publishing. He holds a doctorate in Educational Theory and Philosophy from Rutgers University and received a New Jersey State Council on the Arts grant for playwriting. Phil can be reached at Phil@PhilVassallo.com.